To the editor:

The Maine Legislature’s Environment and Natural Resources Committee is being asked to rush through a bill that would revamp Maine’s mining laws, chiefly to ease the way for an open pit mine on Bald Mountain, in Aroostook County, where deposits of gold, silver, copper and zinc have been discovered.

Introduced at the last minute by Rep. John Martin, D-Eagle Lake, legislators are under immense pressure to push this bill through in the final days of the current legislative session.

This would be a huge mistake. Maine legislators and regulators lack any experience in or knowledge about open pit mining, yet they are being asked to approve a bill that would determine how the state would oversee a mine’s operation.

Open-pit mining is one of the most environmentally destructive industrial processes on the planet, especially when combined with the heap leach metal extraction method that uses cyanide to wash metals out of piles of crushed ore. The results include mountains of toxic tailings and poisoned lakes where waterfowl land but never leave.

Maine’s laws regarding such mines must be carefully considered in consultation with impartial experts in the field — experts that Maine currently lacks.

Regulation after the fact will not correct a poorly written, hastily considered law that has been introduced and rushed through the final days of a short session. Maine deserves far better.

I urge Maine residents to contact their legislators and ask them to set up a study commission to look at open pit mining carefully and to develop the knowledge base necessary to regulate mining intelligently and with forethought. Otherwise, we are asking legislators and regulators to act in ignorance, and the state will suffer as a result.

Jeff Clark,
Bath

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